I wasn’t going to write today, it’s been 3 or 4 weeks since my last blog and wasn’t sure if I could write today or should write, feeling how I feel. Life ‘here on the farm’ has been sad, scary, worrying and fraught. Not a good time or a good place to be and I didn’t want to pass that on to readers or even put how I feel into words, because that makes it all real. But then I remembered that I tell my clients to write, not only when life is good but mostly when it isn’t. To help process whatever it is that is troubling them. To try to make sense of things when they feel overwhelmed. One reason for being reluctant to share my sadness, is that a few weeks ago, I told you all that I was going to be positive, try and inspire, be upbeat, happy and at this moment in time, I can’t be any of that and so wasn’t going to write. But then I remembered, that at the very start of my blogging, around 3 years ago, I promised to ‘tell it as it is’, to always be honest and true to how I felt and how my if was panning out. I said I would write the truth ‘warts ‘n all’. So here I am, back!
Oh how I would love to be writing happy things, encouraging, inspirational words, but sadly, today I can’t. I would like to, keep to what I had said before,but life ain’t like that is it? Things have a way of catching you out, creeping around you and then, when you least expect it, barge into your mind, your life sometimes in great numbers and shatter any peace you may have been feeling. Illness happens, for all of us and for those we love and also to our charges, our animals.Then, feeling happy and upbeat becomes impossible.
For the past 3 years, during the time of David’ having Prostate cancer and the ‘nasties’ courtesy of my eldest daughter and her aunt, one of our precious ponies, Oliver had been ill. I admit to my mind not always being where it should be, with him, but instead,trying to cope with their onslaught. Oliver had a condition called EMS. For those who don’t know it is an illness that means his metabolism is out of kilter his body makes fat and sugar, Rendering him very unwell and often suffering from Laminitis, a condition of the hoof, very painful. We have struggled with him for 3 years, restricting his grazing and not feeding him but keeping him happy and pain-free. We thought we had won the battle but early in March this year, just after my last blog, he became very lame and on x-ray, we found the bones in every foot had dropped. We couldn’t control the pain and so had to make the awful decision to let him go. Broke my heart.Oliver had come to us in a very poor condition, from a rescue centre, who asked us to take him because we had a few of their ponies before and they had all done well. He was emaciated , in very poor condition and was afraid of people.We have watched him blossom. Saying goodbye to him on the 22nd March, with all of his friends around him was devastating. For days, we were all unable to focus, wishing it had been different and that Oliver was grazing in his paddock with his friends. Horses grieve and to watch his ‘herd’ just standing around brought tears to my eyes more than once.
It has been a very hard time in the family in general because Ellie Mae, our little Shih -ztu who has cancer, came very close to us letting her go as well. One day she is ‘okay’ and then the next she is not so good. The advice we have, is that all the time she is doing all the things she has always done, eating, sleeping and interested in things around her, we should leave things as they are. She has been put on steroids and we thought she was improving but no. She has now developed a nasty cough and I know, I once again, have to make that decision that all animal lovers dread. I am very worried about her pal Cody. She has become his ears and eyes as he is now 14 and has little sight and no hearing. He is still the happy tolerant little boy that he has always been but without Ellie? I really don’t know what to do and how to deal with this situation. I have always been the ‘strong one’, the one who makes that final decision but am struggling with this. Feeling physically fragile myself at this time, and emotionally drained doesn’t help.Ellie sleeps a lot more but not at night, which means I have one ear for her, all the time and am getting very little sleep. She has bad days, then good days. Again, we know we are on borrowed time but I really believe this is the last time I will be blogging with her at my feet.
In between today and the last time I wrote, with losing Oliver and Ellie being ill, I discovered that my son was having problems that I can’t help him with. Any of you who are parents, will know how hard this is and how helpless you feel. I have to just sit back and wait for him to come to me. Then there was Mother’s Day. Always a hard day for me. As a younger mum, my little girls, then young women, would always spoil me, make me feel the luckiest and ‘best’ mum in the world. These past 6 years it has not been that way. It has become a day I dread. A day that has been marred in the past by some. But this year even though I was spoiled again by my youngest daughter, Marie and her husband, giving me flowers, smellies, chocolates and pot plants, I still felt sad, bereft. I did have a beautiful bouquet of flowers and a much-needed phone-call from my son Jonathan. Although all of this made me feel better having just lost Oliver, made it hard for any of us to enjoy the day. And then there is the ‘missing’. I still can’t get used to this feeling of incompleteness. When one of your children is not in touch with you, estranged from you, days such as these are particularly hard. Not that I only miss Lisa on Mothers day, no. I miss her every single day, as those of you who are in similar positions know. So sadness was the main emotion .
One of the ‘sads’ today, is my having to acknowledge the changes in my wonderful man. My rock. David was always the positive one. I was the emotionally strong one , he the physically strong one. We made a good team. No I rephrase that, we still make a good team. The same team but different. Before PC came barging into our lives, trampling over everything good. Although I personally have suffered loss, unfair treatment from ‘family, I could always depend on my family ‘here on the farm’. My husband was always ready to support me, comfort me, help me and so was my youngest daughter. They still are but now life is different and the past few months have shown that so clearly. We have a large garden, 6 plus acres with paddocks etc and he has always kept them all in good order. We have been renovating an old Georgian house, still are but now it seems to be harder for him to keep up any kind of effort. He tires so easily, isn’t able to do things in the time frame that he could before cancer with a little ‘c’ struck. He doesn’t ask for help, not in his nature but did get someone in to clear some of the brambles last year,at my insistence, but that was it. The poly tunnel that had been so productive needs new life breathing into it. The whole garden needs sorting out and he was reluctant to ‘get a man in’ as an old friend of ours used to say. But we have now discussed this and he admits to not having the strength he used to have. It breaks my heart to watch him struggle. To hear the sadness and almost embarrassment in his voice when he says ‘we need help with the land love’. I hate cancer with a vengeance! It has stolen so much from us as a couple but more importantly, from David. I love him with every ounce of my being and so grateful for his being through to the other side of PC but hate hate hate what is has taken from him. But we will ‘get a man in’ or two and get the place back to how it was and then, look for a new home, a smaller one with no land, just a good-sized garden, somewhere near Marie’s new project.This time it will be chosen just for us. We have never been able to do that, having children, 2 daughters when we met, we have always considered them when looking for a home. But this time, it will be just for us, our choice and I need to look forward to that. A new adventure, something to look ahead to and enjoy. So maybe I need to start that today.
Wouldn’t it be good, if when we feel down, sad, we could flick a switch and feel better. There are times in life when things happen, that we can, in a way, rise above whatever it is. Choose a different thought. Take a different path, or as some would say, move on’. But as we all know, or rather (remembering these are my thoughts, my perceptions,) as I know, I don’t believe you can. Move on I mean. Not easily anyway. Over the past few years, life has thrown many curve balls at our little family and as hard as we try to dodge them, they always seem to hit us full on. I am sure this happens to many of you, to everyone but this is my life, my blog, from my perception, so please forgive me if you find it too personal, too much about ‘me’ but I can only speak for myself.
Recap of the past few years, with some things left out. Another exercise I get clients to do.
2010 we moved to West Wales and life was wonderful. 2012, after losing my beloved horse, Star,I was embroiled in a horrid ‘hoax’ that ended in court. Cruel and damaging but I bounced back. 2013 my eldest daughter, because of my not being prepared to lie for her, shut me out of her and my grandchildren’s life. Resulting in years of online bullying by her and her ‘friends’.2014 my youngest daughter lost her baby, my last much wanted grandchild.My eldest daughter Georgina lost her fight against cancer. 2016 my son became gravely ill and so did my youngest daughter. She recovered and so did he but both with lasting issues. 2017 David was diagnosed with PC. We all know the journey that is and the pain and worry, fear and helplessness it gives.2018 My beloved brother Tony lost his fight with cancer and the man who became my dad died.My health has been poor resulting in my hospital stay in January this year. This year is all written about above. So,remembering something my dad used to say, that ‘He only gives you as much as he knows you can take’. Sorry dad, but I think ‘He’ has got it wrong. I am almost out of ‘taking’.
Now making sense of this blog, of how I feel today. I will follow my own teachings now.
Life will improve but only if I give it a kick up the proverbial. Thinking about it, talking about it, writing about it is good but changing it, at least the way I think about it, is down to me.
The positives are this. David is still here, still with me and the cancer has gone. My health will always be poor but I cope. My two books, one of which is a 2nd edition are both selling well and a third on the way. Marie is moving next week, later than we first thought, to begin her own Equine Therapy project in a lovely spot and will live close by. The blossoms are in full glory all over the land, the spring flowers are still in bloom and the holiday park at the end of our land is open. Summer is on the way. and do you know what? I am already beginning to feel better so yes, writing things down, sharing your innermost thoughts and feelings does help. So, sorry for being on a downer but I will do what I always do and bounce back again, very soon. You have all helped, so thank you for reading. x
Post script.
Since writing this, Ellie Mae my precious little girl Shih tzu, lost her fight against cancer. She was in my arms, still fighting the vet, trying to ‘protect me’ from her when she left us. I couldn’t put her down, cried it seemed for days. Then a few weeks later our wonderful 29 inch stallion, Oberon, had a choke and eventually we had to let him go as well. Been a horrid time ‘here on the farm’. If you read current blogs, June July this year, you will see that more of our little ones have been ill and we had a Strangle fright. Today, 7th July, 2 of our minis have gone down with laminitis. So things have not improved and I am worn out as is David. The sanitising and sterilising we had to do during the Strangles fright were such a lot of hard work but had to be done to protect our other ponies.As it turned out, it had not been necessary.
I have written again to my eldest daughter and hope if I keep on writing, one day she will reply. I hope.I don’t want sorries, don’t expect explanations, just want contact.I have also written to my grandson but heard nothing.
So let’s hope a new week will bring some respite. Thank you for reading. x
carolannwright 
All we can do is what we do. Rest when you need to. Sending love.
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Thanks Diane, yes you are right. I’ll be fine. x
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